For instance I heard American schools focus more on finding the reasonable solutions, so they would develop critical thinking skills. And in Asia, they focus on the answers, so they would need to memorize a lot of things. I also heard in France they learn about philosophy, and the meaning of life etc. So they would need to read, and write alot.
I wanna know what your country secondary school education is like, and what do they focus on? What’s the goal for it? What do you like/hate about it? Do you think what you are learning is useful for living?
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Depending on the program you choose yourself they either prepare you for working in a line of work directly or prepare you for further studies at a university. Many who picked Science might go into medicine while many who picked Technology went into engineering and the Builders programs well… They started working at a construction company right out of High School.
Of course they teach critical thinking and so on that is the ground works for the entire education system right now. That students should learn to find information themselves and apply source criticism.
The goal is to learn to pass the matura exams. No critical thinking. No learning about finding information and checking if it’s real. No things useful in life. Just random stuff you have to memorize, and most of the time you repeat the stuff from primary school. 🙂 And teachers make you think that you have to know and remember everything and have no right to ask questions if you don’t know something and that grades is the only thing that matters in life.
Most people in Poland hate school experience for a reason. The only ones that like school are most probably the ones who have no friends and have nothing else to do than to focus on learning and getting good grades.
In high school you can choose different profiles, e.g. biology-chemistry, maths-physics, humanities etc., but it doesn’t matter when you start university. When you go to university, you have ice bucket challenge but it’s a whole tank truck and you’re also slapped in the face with a metal door. Unless you have a really, REALLY good teacher who can teach you something more than for matura exams, you’ll struggle in university.
Well the largest problem that most people within education have been noticing in our education is, that we have two types secondary school, which both more or less determine your career path. Which is really bad as you have to basically decide on it at the age of 13.
The two types are: Vocational secondary school. You learn a specific vocation, and are supposed to just start working in it after 3-4 years. Because most people don’t know or want to decide on their entire career path, they prefer the second option – the “high school”.
In “high school” (aka gymnasium) you have the “core” classes, and then depending on the high school you attend you can choose different types. For instance back when I was going to high school I chose “social sciences” module, which had more geography, history, philosophy and sociology.
But the problem is, that the main purpose of “high schools” is to prepare you for “matura” (just as the polish person wrote), which is the final exam, which greatly impacts your score to enter various “faculties”. We have a small number of universities, so the faculties at them are what’s important.
So in the end no matter how you choose you have to take important almost life-changing decisions at 13, which can’t be reversed easily.
There was some attempts to bridge the gaps, so you actually can with additional courses go from vocational secondary school to university. My friend did this, going from vocational school for economics (I think it was kind of an accountant type school), through loads of additional courses, which cost him money and time, to then enrol into Faculty of Economics, only to realise in his second year that actually this type of economics (that is, the more theoretical) doesn’t particularly interests him.
TL;DR: everyone know that our current system is broken and only produces people who are good at taking “matura” tests so that they can get to the faculty of their choice. But many times the faculty of their choice has way different type of learning and lectures than what they prepared for at school.
For example: One of the most coveted study program is Medicine. But you only have one year at high school biology that is about human body and anatomy. I haven’t studied medicine, but I heard many “horror” stories, of people burning out, because of the whiplash between what they learnt at high school, and what was expected of them at university…
The following is not what I “think”, but what I was told during my education as a teacher, and is also more or less common knowledge in my country.
Secondary school here comes in two stages, Secondary I and II, that come in three levels, or maybe sections, with different requirements to the pupil. They lead to different kinds of tertiary educations.
Stage Secondary I is part of the *Volksschule*, i.e. it’s compulsory for every child. These are grades 7-9, pupils are aged 12/13-15/16. The three levels have different names in every canton. Let’s call’em (A), (B), (C). They all prepare for the Stage II of secondary education.
(A) prepares the pupil to visit a *Maturitätsschule* without any other conditions. The Maturitätsschule takes 3-4 years and gives a pupil a very broad general knowledge and “maturity” (hence the name). With a *Matura* degree, a student is free to visit each and any institute of tertiary education (University, college) in the country.
(B) prepares the pupil to visit a Maturitätsschule under the condition that they have good grades or pass an evaluation exam, a *Fachmittelschule* which acts a bit like a *Maturitätsschule* with a more practical/vocational focus like Arts, Technology/IT, or Social work, or to enter a vocational training as apprentice in a job with higher specialisation, like IT, lab assistant, administration and services.
(C) prepares pupils for a vocational training in all kind of jobs.
During apprenticeship, the apprentice visits a school to learn general knowledge (history, language, science) and the theoretical background of their craft.
Secondary II is just that, and it’s usually 3-4 years: Maturitäts- and Fachmittelschule and vocational training accompanied with visiting a trade school once or twice a week for general education.
The degrees are the aforementioned *Matura* and the *Fachdiplom* on the Fachmittelschule, that permits to visit institutions of higher vocational training called *Höhere Fachschule*, e.g. designer, paramedic, nurse, manager, hotellier. The vocational training on the job or apprenticeship ends with a Certificate of Qualification in that job, e.g. electrician, bricklayer, baker, hairdresser, chef.
In some apprenticeships, you can finish them with a *Berufsmaturität*, “vocational maturity”, that allows you to visit what you would call “Universities of applied science”, but we call them *Fachhochschule*. These are not universities in the strict sense that allow PhD’s, but do offer bachelor’s and master’s degrees. Schools for Engineers and architects come to mind here, art academies, teacher colleges. With an extra year of preparatory school and an qualification exam, the student can also enter regular universities.
And thanks to this system that teaches skill and knowledge, maturity and purpose, our youth unemployment is at an all-time low and we really ace at the WorldSkills championships 💪🛠️🔬📚
(yes, it’s got its flaws and problems, and it can always be better, but all in all it works really great)